I'm the Silicon Valley correspondent of L'Expansion, France's business magazine and I've been writing about technology and investing for the past 20+ years, in both Europe and the U.S. At Forbes, I focus on the intersection of technology, investing and design. I'm also a real geek with a BSc (Hns) in Computing for Real-Time Systems from Bristol Polytechnic in the UK. My love of gourmet food led me to co-found Frenchery, a luxury online gourmet grocery store with free home delivery in the San Francisco Bay Area and the largest selection of Foie Gras in the U.S. Follow me on Twitter, LinkedIn or e-mail jeanbsu at gmail.

It has no chance to make a dent in the highly competitive smartphone market dominated by Samsung and Apple, or even attract the ex-RIM crowd.

After almost 2-months of continuous testing, the Lumia 920 is probably one of the worst smartphone that I have tried lately.

Here are my 5 top reasons not to buy it, even on sale at $40 on Amazon:

it’s bulky,

heavy,

overheats,

has a short battery life,

and takes blurry pictures.

So when I see glorifying reviews of the Lumia 920 from around the Web – like the UK’s Independent (most advanced smartphone) or Mark Cuban‘s (crushes the iPhone 5) – I wonder if their hatred for the iPhone or Google‘s Android – or their love for Microsoft Windows – ran so deep that it distorted their reality field.

On the hardware side, the Lumia 920 is simply dreadful. Despite the heavy weight and thickness, the phone’s short battery life is a mystery to me.

Under “normal” condition, i.e. regular data usage (emails/texts, Facebook but no Netflix), phone calls, photos and some apps (Evernote, Kindle, Yelp), the Lumia will barely survive until mid-afternoon. If I dare use the GPS/Maps it dies by noon. And that’s after switching to a second unit after the first one simply died after I tried to reset it! Fortunately, Nokia’s very able PR agency overnighted another one so I could continue testing.

Despite all the praise and the marketing around the Lumia PureView integrated camera, the results were a constant disappointment. The phone is slow at taking pictures that end up systematically a bit blur and is simply unusable under low light. In comparison, the iPhone 5 camera did a good job under the same conditions, which I’m sure is also the case with the Galaxy S3.

The videos were no better in quality and the lack of a one-click upload option to YouTube made it too hard for me to upload them. I had to either transfer the videos to my Mac – luckily Microsoft has a very good Windows Phone for Mac software – or transfer it to my Microsoft Skydrive online storage space, and then upload it to YouTube.

At this point, the Lumia 920 was a non-starter. However, the phone had some features I really enjoyed, like its sturdiness – I accidentally dropped it from hip level on concrete which caused a little bend on the corner -, that I could use gloves to operate the touch screen – it was getting so cold in the Bay Area that I needed some! -, Nokia Maps and Drive and the Office applications.

The Microsoft Windows Phone 8 software that runs the phone took some time getting used to, coming from iOS or Android. I didn’t like the “Start” screen with the icons that I had to manually size myself – luckily I didn’t have much to add -, the lack of a “Favorites” on the Phone app, the “fuzzy” randomness of the pictures displayed by the Photo app, and that irritating “cursor” that is so hard to move to a particular place in a text. However, I liked the Facebook integration and how easy it was to add email accounts.

Overall, the Lumia 920 was a real disappointment, knowing Nokia’s long history and experience in this space. Thus it pains me to say that, if you want to stick with Windows Phone 8, HTC’s lighter and thinner 8X looks like a much better alternative.

Post Your Comment

Post Your Reply

Forbes writers have the ability to call out member comments they find particularly interesting. Called-out comments are highlighted across the Forbes network. You'll be notified if your comment is called out.

Comments

So after reading a “review” not longer than one page and without even try to use the Lumia 920 yourself you now claim that it is a bad phone? Sorry man but you are a complete joke. Get lost Apple/ Android Fanboy

I own a 920, after more than a month’s use I can tell you this phone is way better than the iPhone 4 and android (Nexus) I owned before. I am not sure how you missed so many goodies of this phone, certainly not a worthy review.

I agree, this phone doesn’t even deserve to be reviewed, even less on Forbes. In a few weeks or so, everybody would have forgotten about it (the phone, the review, Nokia?). It’ll be all about Galaxy s4, BB10 and maybe Nexus X.

What a horrible and false review of the Nokia Lumia 920 this is. I’ve had this phone for a month and it is wonderful on every level. No, it is not thick and heavy (especially since it doesn’t need a case–thanks to it’s durability). Anyone who wants to see how strong it is, please check out the YouTube videos by Phonebuff…the man even drove over the Lumia 920 with his car and not only did it not crack, it still worked. The battery life is awesome. Photos and video are beyond excellent–what you can do in low light is Pureview magic! The reason this phone is getting great reviews, in general, is because it IS great. What a shame Forbes has posted such a bias and false review.

I’m not sure if you’re talking about the next version of the phone but that’s not my experience at all. I have to keep charging the phone to make sure I don’t drain the battery after a few hours of use. The photo and video are beyond bad. Honestly, I would prefer a phone that would crash when I drive over it but has better performance and features than the Lumia 920. The HTC 8X looks awesome by the way!

I am hugely disappointed that such biased and blatantly painted review can be published under the name of Forbes. It is full of sweeping statements and generalizations. I don’t have a problem with criticism of the phone but the inconsistent statements e.g “After two months of continuous testing” (which obviously is untrue given your utter dislike for the phone) all you can come up with is “It overheats (under what conditions if I may ask). It takes bad pictures (some samples please). Pardon me but your claim of being ‘product guy’ seems hardly legitimate given the fact that your blog techpulse 360 hardly doesnt even have a single review on any other phone or for that matter any other PRODUCT (only Dells business, Nokia maps business etc). @Forbes: you can count on my company not subscribing for your next year subscription.

Titan, get over it. It’s not worth it. The 920 is doomed. Hopefully the Lumia brand will not suffer too much. If our beloved company comes out with another one like that, we’re toast. Let’s hope for the best. On the overheating issue, check out Nokia Conversations and the Support Forums. It overheats in normal situation/usage. And it dies also after normal usage. What have we done?